This invention is in the field of security systems, digital media systems, and wireless systems enabling multimedia. We discuss background for each of these areas.
Devices and services for multimedia messaging. Digital cameras, cameras integrated with cell phones and other media capture devices are increasing in number and usage. Such devices are commonly offered for sale, and services referred to as “multimedia messaging” offered by providers, such as Sprint and T-Mobile, allow wireless transmission of digital images as part of a multimedia e-mail. These services require moderate bandwidth and are offered today in the United States, Europe and in parts of Asia.
Devices available for such digital media-oriented services include non-integrated offerings, such as cell phones which attach via cable or wireless communication to cameras. One example offered by Nokia is the Nokia camera headset, which attaches to compatible Nokia mobile phones for image viewing and wireless transmission of images.
Integrated devices are also available for digital media-oriented services. An example offered by Nokia is the Nokia 3650, with an integrated digital VGA (video graphics adaptor) camera. Sanyo and others offer integrated devices, e.g., the Sanyo 5300 has a built-in VGA camera and external color display.
Multimedia messaging services, such as PCS (personal communications system) vision service from Sprint, allow users to capture, transmit and receive digital images. In accordance with such a service, a user snaps pictures with a PCS vision camera. The pictures may then be uploaded so as to be shared with others. Vision-enabled PCS phones with picture capability can view, access, and share pictures, right on the display screen of the phone. These services add images to existing voice and text messaging, thus providing a multimedia messaging service.
Digital media and content management. Digital media is created not only through capture of an image or video using a digital device, but also through digitizing existing analog media. Manipulation of such data has been pioneered by the entertainment industry, with applications such as reissuance of old films to be sold in the new DVD (digital video or versatile disk) format providing business incentive. Management of such digital assets is an important element of such reuse and repurposing.
Media management systems in general refer to systems that capture, digitize and allow management of media assets. Media management systems are widely used in the entertainment industry and advertising, where content grows rapidly and where efficient access to stored items can provide business advantage. IBM Content Manager is an example of such a system and provides workload processing involved in the media value chain of ingest, annotation, cataloguing, archiving, search and retrieval, and optionally digital media streaming.
There are a number of techniques for managing and protecting digital content. By way of example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,182,218 discloses a system for managing digital content, particularly a digital content to which a copyright is claimed, and a system for supplying a public-key used in the management of the content. This reference also discloses how to alleviate unauthorized use of the content.
Emergency and security devices and services. In 1957, the National Association of Fire Chiefs recommended use of a single number for reporting fires, and in 1968, AT&T announced 911 as the nationwide emergency number. Since that time, 911 has represented the standard for emergency services response.
Enhancements of the original 911 service are disclosed by references such as U.S. Pat. No. 6,292,542, which teaches alternate methods for accessing emergency services by telephone.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,477,362 teaches techniques which pass the mobile unit's phone number along to an appropriate emergency service center in addition to location information. This reference shows how this additional information can be transmitted and revealed in an emergency situation.
Flight data recorders, also known as “black boxes,” provide information on airline accidents. It is known that large commercial aircraft and some smaller commercial, corporate, and private aircraft are required by the FAA (Federal Aviation Association) to be equipped with two black boxes that record information about a flight. Both recorders are installed to help reconstruct the events leading to an aircraft accident. One of these, the CVR (cockpit voice recorder), records radio transmissions and sounds in the cockpit, such as the pilot's voices and engine noises. The other, the FDR (flight data recorder), monitors parameters such as altitude, airspeed and heading. While this information does not prevent accidents, it can be used to help determine the cause of an accident after it has happened.
Another safety concern lies not with airplanes, but with individuals. Personal safety is a fundamental issue, and of increasing priority to people living all over the world. Women in particular, have long taken extra precautions when traveling alone or in areas deemed to be of higher risk, such as city streets late at night. Children of any age are deemed to be more at risk from violence, whether it be in the playground, at school, or elsewhere.
Technology has been applied to make this problem more tractable. Cellular phones are often given to individuals as a measure of increasing safety. Individuals with physical disabilities may use cell phones to call for assistance when needed; children are given cell phones by worried parents so that the parents can have the comfort of near-instant contact when desired.
Surveillance systems. Current digital video surveillance systems (e.g., Lenel, Inc.) primarily exploit digital infrastructure to store and distribute surveillance footage digitally. In surveillance systems, cameras that monitor people, things, and/or places often feed still images or low frame rate analog video into video recorders for recording and storage with possible use as evidence in the event of litigation. Sometimes digital cameras are employed as surveillance and security monitoring devices and they result in digital media which is stored for later use. The digital form allows for compressed storage and rapid distribution to central servers for further analysis. The current state of the art in surveillance involves human monitoring of the video, while it is being recorded or after it has been recorded, to generate real-time alerts of incidents, to track and mark anomalous events for interdiction, or later search and retrieval to prescribe preventative safety measures in public places, etc.
Problems with the Above-described Systems. Emergency services as described above do not provide maximum information related to the emergency. 911 services are voice-oriented, and provide little deterrent to crime and emergencies of a security nature. Many news magazine stories are based around chilling 911 tapes that while heartrending cannot be used to identify perpetrators of crime. Accordingly, there is a need for techniques that provide more information, such as image data available from integrated devices, and that provide it under conditions which may precede an emergency.
Emergency monitors, such as surveillance cameras, are not ubiquitous. While a camera may observe the area in front of an ATM (automated teller machine), there are many locations not surveyed by such instrumentality. Police officers on the streets patrol physically in order to prevent crime, and while video in police cars captures some interactions between police and others, there are many locations at any given time where police are not present and where problems occur. Accordingly, there is a need for techniques that provide video and image surveillance at the point of need.
Manual emergency procedures, such as dispatch of police units, often rely on subjective measures and memories for follow-up action. Accordingly, there is a need for techniques that capture, at the point of need and potentially prior to an emergency, data that can assist in follow up actions. Further, there is a need for techniques that minimize latency in triggering such capture. An additional need is to collect such data in a manner that its existence is known and may act as a deterrent to crime.
Recently more attention is being paid to harnessing the true advantage of digital video, namely, the capability to automatically analyze and index the video in real time. Such systems can be utilized in airports, high security facilities such as nuclear power plants, or even post offices. These systems serve fixed areas, generally by means of fixed cameras. The cameras are either wired, or else communicate through limited range wireless capability. Accordingly, there is a need for techniques that provide digital media benefits at the point of need, for example, in a WAN (wide area network) environment.
Information such as that captured by surveillance gear is today analyzed manually, for the most part, and therefore not scaleable. As more data is captured from integrated devices, the amount of data grows dramatically. When such large amounts are captured through devices, as we have described, there can be difficulties in analyzing it in a timely fashion. Accordingly, there is a need for techniques that automatically analyze such data, for example, to allow scaleability.